The AFM-compatible stress examination device was designed to investigate thin gold films deposited on PDMS substrate. The stretching stage has following features:

• symmetrical movement relative to the centre of the sample, facilitating recording of comparable images;
• electrical connections to the sample insulated from the stage body;
• remote control using a dc actuator;
• low height to fit to the microscope set-up (originally: Veeco Nanoman VS).

I obtained the Au@PDMS samples from prof. Sigurd Wagner of Princeton University. The dc actuator driver was designed by Piotr Sówka. I carried out the experiments with Magdalena Moczała and Karolina Orłowska.

We described the device in details in a paper entitled “A symmetrical stretching stage for electrical atomic force microscopy” (Measurement 87, 2016). Moreover, it was used e.g. in research reported by W. Kaczorowski, K. Gajewski et al.. in “Evaluation of mechanical properties of carbon coatings synthesised in radio frequency plasma on PDMS” (Surface and Coatings Technology 333, 2018) and reported by K. Gajewski, W. Szymański et al. in “Quasi in-situ observation of the elastic properties changes of the graphene–low-density polyethylene composites” (Diamond and Related Materials 82, 2018).